


who are you (to make me feel so good)

by rclarkie16



Category: The Wilds (TV 2020)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/F, sort of a onesided enemies to lovers, toni and shelby are project partners, toni is a little hothead
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-19
Updated: 2021-03-19
Packaged: 2021-03-28 01:13:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,041
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30131715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rclarkie16/pseuds/rclarkie16
Summary: Toni Shalifoe gets partnered with Shelby Goodkind for a semester-long project and lets her emotions get the best of her. She came to USC to play basketball, not fall in love with the stereotypical girl next door who won't leave her the hell alone for some reason. Can she keep her focus on basketball or will new feelings threaten to turn her world on its axis?
Relationships: Martha Blackburn & Toni Shalifoe, Shelby Goodkind/Toni Shalifoe
Comments: 6
Kudos: 66





	who are you (to make me feel so good)

**Author's Note:**

> So, I'm a little late jumping on The Wilds train, but better late than never, right? I watched the entire season in one night last month and could not get this idea out of my head, so here it is! Please enjoy it and let me know what you think.
> 
> The title is from Ellie Goulding's song "This Love Will Be Your Downfall."

“I should’ve just skipped college and gone straight to the WNBA,” Toni Shalifoe decides as she comes to a halt in front of one of the many nondescript buildings that litter the University of Southern California’s campus. It looms over her small form as she turns to the slightly taller girl standing to her left. 

You would never know it's January from the clear, sunny skies and the 70-degree humidity that half of Californians are blessed with on the regular. This time back home, Toni would've been a literal marshmallow swallowed in a puffy parka and ski pants riding on the back of a snowmobile to school.

Now she's dressed in a simple basketball t-shirt and shorts and the breeze carries the smell of the ocean instead of the chill of Minnesotan winter. 

“It’s just a marketing class, Toni, not quantum physics,” Martha Blackburn, her best – and arguably only – friend points out, used to Toni’s antics by now.

“Tomato, potato,” Toni waves her hand around apathetically. She knows she’ll have to enter the building at some point, but she’ll stall for as long as she can until she doesn’t have a choice.

Martha gives her an unimpressed look, “I’m positive that’s not how that expression is used.”

“You’re not an English major, Marty, so don’t try to tell me how expressions work,” the other girl rolls her eyes.

“I know what you’re doing,” Martha eyes her knowingly.

“Enlighten me.”

“You don’t want to go into the big, scary business building, so you’re standing out here arguing with me about expressions instead.”

It’s scary how well Martha knows Toni sometimes. Almost as if she’s reading her mind.

Toni crosses her arms defensively, her best friend’s assumption, no matter how correct it is, is an indirect insult to her pride. And if there’s one thing that she definitely isn’t, it’s scared. Toni Shalifoe isn’t scared of anything, especially not an inanimate object. If anything, the building should be scared of her. 

So, obviously, she says, “I’m _not_ scared.”

“Then why are you standing out here when your class starts in,” Martha taps her phone and holds it up to Toni’s face, “a minute.”

“No one’s ever on time in college, Marty.” Toni should know, this is their second semester at USC, after all. She’s a seasoned pro by now.

Raising her eyebrows, Martha pockets the phone, “They are if they don’t want to sit in the front of the lecture hall on the first day of class. Do you know what that means?” Lifting her hand to mock-whisper, “You get to go first for icebreakers.”

Shit.

Toni hadn’t thought about that. She has absolutely no interest in participating in whatever activity the professor deems necessary for the class to get to know one another. In fact, Toni has no interest in getting to know anyone in a snooty marketing class for business majors, even though she technically is one herself.

She's never really been a people person. That's Martha's department. The girl could make friends with just about anything with a heartbeat. 

But that's not Toni. She doesn't really do the whole 'nice' thing very well. 

This means she has absolutely no desire to sit in the front row and have the professor use her as the guinea pig for their introduction game.

“Really should get going,” gripping her bag strap, Toni starts walking backward in the direction of the doors. “See ya, Marty!”

Toni tries to pretend she doesn’t hear Martha giggling at her expense before she turns to go through the door. Not that she really cares anyway. Martha is probably the only person she’s ever let laugh at her without threatening retaliation in the form of violence.

Trust her, there's been plenty of violence in the eighteen years she's been alive. 

Martha’s been Toni’s best friend since fifth grade, when Toni had been placed with a decent _ish_ foster family on a reservation in the middle of nowhere, Minnesota. A group of boys had been teasing Martha about her frog hat/poncho that she had been wearing one day at recess when Toni had stumbled across them on the playground.

It had taken Toni all of fifteen seconds of listening to them taunting her before the first punch was thrown. A lunch aide had to pull the small and scrappy girl off one of the boys who had begun to cry when her tiny fist made contact with his face. She’d been taken to the principal’s office while the three boys were sent to the nurse.

Despite getting her first suspension – of many – at her new school, at least something good had come out of it.

Martha.

The two of them became as thick as thieves afterward. Martha somehow manages to somewhat mellow out the fiery and ill-tempered Toni, while Toni will defend the other girl until her dying breath. Martha has never missed one of Toni’s basketball games and there is never a jingle competition that Toni isn’t there for – no matter how soft it makes her look to be seen cheering for her best friend.

So, when it came time for the two to go to college, it was an easy decision for them to stay together. Martha had gotten a generous scholarship to USC because of her high GPA, the most money offered to her from any of the many schools she applied to. She was extremely interested in the college's environmental science program, a career choice that was no surprise to Toni, or anyone really. Martha literally wanted to save the world one kind gesture at a time. 

Meanwhile, Toni had been sitting on offers from around the country for her basketball prowess and USC just happened to be one of them. It didn't hurt that the school had a great basketball program. So, it seemed like a no-brainer for them to just move across the country together. Plus, it made their living situation easier because they got a dorm together instead of rooming with total strangers.

This would be their second semester at USC and Toni is admittedly more excited about it than the first. Not that the first semester had been unremarkable, but college parties get old after the first couple of weeks. Plus, the course loads left her wondering if she should’ve just skipped college in the first place.

Yet now that basketball season is upon them, it makes dealing with homework that much easier. The only interactions that she’s had with the basketball team thus far were either at the aforementioned parties; or in their grueling preseason workouts, which spanned most of the first semester for some ungodly reason.

Knowing that the thrill of hitting a three-pointer with a cheering crowd as the background made getting up for her 8 a.m. this morning a little bit easier. Martha hadn’t even needed to bribe her out from under the covers with a first-day coffee like she’d done the first day the previous semester. Toni had beaten her alarm, the thought of playing in an actual game in less than a couple of weeks giving her a surge of energy.

That is until Toni remembered that she had three classes to make it through before practice.

Upon entering the lecture hall, Toni makes a beeline for an open spot three rows from the back, thanking the basketball gods — because let’s be honest, Toni doesn’t believe in a God that condemns people for their sexuality – for allowing her to sink into the chair unnoticed by the professor beginning her lecture at the front of the room.

“Welcome to Marketing 101. I’m your professor, Gretchen Klein, and…” Toni’s attention shifts from the business causal dressed professor to the clock on the wall behind her, following the long, skinny arm as it ticks off the seconds until she can leave. Professor Klein drones on about the semester’s syllabus and course requirements. “…which brings me to the most important part of this class, your Marketing Campaign project. It’ll be worth 70% of your final grade and you’ll be partnered with one of your classmates.”

Toni’s spine bumps the back of her chair as she slumps in her seat. Great. Partner projects are right up there on her list of things she does not under any circumstances want to do, right along with talk to most people – aside from Marty and some of her teammates, of course. It’s two of the things that Toni disliked the most.

In high school, Toni sometimes got lucky and could just pick Marty as her partner. They worked together seamlessly due to their years of friendship, and Toni usually ended up doing the grunt work instead of the research, which she liked just fine.

Other times, the teacher picked partners and it ended up in two different scenarios. One was that they stuck her with someone just as academically challenged – or worse – than she is. Or two, she got paired up with a try-hard who would boss her around the entire time. Toni usually preferred the former.

Unfortunately, this time it seemed as though Professor Klein would be determining her fate, not that Toni paid enough attention during the awkward icebreakers to know who she would even choose if it were up to her.

So, she waits as the woman reads predetermined pairs of names off a list to find out which sap she’ll be stuck with for the entire semester. It can’t be any worse than James Reed, a stoner Toni worked in her sophomore American History class. He’d been so high that he’d turned in a drawing of a squirrel instead of their actual paper.

Nothing can be as bad as that one.

Professor Klein begins reading off the partners and it’s no surprise that she doesn’t utter Toni’s name until the very end. The universe loves keeping her in suspense no matter the situation.

“Toni Shalifoe…” Toni watches as the older woman draws a line across the chart with her pen,” and Shelby Goodkind.”

Toni can’t remember which of the girls in the room introduced herself as Shelby Goodkind, but it sounds like a generic-pumpkin-spiced-latte-drinking-basic-white-girl-from-a-rich-ass-family name, which is absolutely perfect. Just what Toni needs in her life right now.

And although she hadn’t paid attention during the introductions, she has an inkling that Shelby Goodkind is the blonde girl near the front of the room that turned around in her seat at the mention of their names to beam back at her.

Amazing.

It’ll be the kind of partner project where she’s stuck with the bossy know-it-all. There goes the possibility that her partner won’t get on her nerves. Maybe she’ll at least get to slack off after this Shelby girl realizes she’s not a straight ‘A’ genius and decides it will be easier if she takes over everything.

Eventually, Professor Klein dismisses them into their pairs for the last ten minutes or so of class to get ‘further acquainted’ with each other.

Toni doesn’t even need to attempt to leave her seat before the blonde girl from the front is falling into the seat beside her, hand stretched out and a megawatt smile displaying two perfect rows of teeth.

“Hi there.” The blonde – Shelby, Toni lazily reminds herself – chirps. “I’m Shelby. You’re Toni, right?”

Shelby Goodkind has a couple of inches on Toni with long blonde hair and the greenest eyes she’s ever seen. Her voice has a slight southern accent to it that the other girl can’t quite place, yet knows it has to be from somewhere way down south.

Toni can admit that she’s pretty, hot even, but she definitely isn’t her type. She doesn’t go for preppy, cheerleader-type white girls that probably do extra credit schoolwork for fun. Usually, Toni goes for the more _alternative_ girls that lean on the shy side – or she did at least. It doesn’t seem like a good idea to pursue the same kind of girl ever again after how that ended.

“Yup.” Toni’s response is curt. She doesn’t make a move to shake Shelby’s outstretched hand, something the other girl quickly takes note of, letting it fall back to her side and continues, unperturbed.

“Well, I’m from Fort Travis, Texas. Born and raised,” Shelby begins telling her life story as if Toni had _asked._ “I’m a freshman and a business major at USC. Go Trojans!” She does little jazz hands and Toni’s eye twitches minutely. “Where are you from?”

“Middle of Nowhere, Minnesota.”

If Shelby’s unsettled by Toni’s abrasiveness, she does a fantastic job of hiding it. Either that or she’s just that nice. The thought makes Toni even more skeptical of the girl sitting not two feet away from her.

“I’ve never been to Minnesota before,” Shelby furrows her brow. “I’ve never really been much of anywhere besides here and Texas.”

Toni didn’t like Minnesota much either. “You’re not missing out there.”

“So, are you a business major, too?”

Apparently, Shelby just isn’t getting the hint from Toni’s stellar conversational skills that the basketball player isn’t one for small talk. “Um, I guess so.”

Shelby tilts her head. “What do you mean by that? Are you undecided?”

“I mean that’s what my advisor told me to use as my major, but I don’t plan on using it,” Toni watches as Shelby squints a little in confusion and takes pity on her. “I’m going to play professional basketball. I might not even finish college if I can get drafted.”

Her answer isn’t what the other girl was expecting because Shelby’s lips purse and she raises an eyebrow. “Ok, but what if basketball doesn’t work out? What’s your backup plan?”

Suddenly, Toni feels a familiar heat rush to her face as her blood pressure spikes. These are feelings that she knows all too well as the early warning signs that she’s about to lose her temper.

Some overpriced therapist had made her detail every single thing that typically led up Toni blowing her top in order to ‘stop the anger before it boils over.’ It was an effort made in vain by one of the wealthier foster families that thought they could ‘fix’ her.

They’d sent her back to the group home the moment she’d slammed a sliding glass door shut so hard that the entire thing had shattered. It sucked only because, despite the fact that the couple was obviously doing it to get some good karma, they always had a stocked pantry and Toni had a warm bed to sleep in. She couldn’t always say the same for the other foster families she lived with.

But the therapist did teach her one helpful thing to rein in her anger and that was to let it go the same way she let the breath out of her body. The only thing is that sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.

This is why Toni takes a deep breath before answering Shelby through a clenched jaw, “I don’t need a backup plan because I’m _going_ to play in the WNBA.”

It’s not like Toni doesn’t know that she needs to have a Plan B. She knows that getting all it takes is one injury for her dreams to go down the toilet. It definitely wouldn’t happen due to lack of talent because if there’s one thing Toni knows it’s that she’s great at basketball. Still, there’s not a career more unstable than that of a professional athlete.

So, _yes_ , she knows that she needs a backup plan, but hearing some random girl she just met tell her just makes her blood boil.

Shelby doesn’t seem too keen on fighting with Toni on her future, though. “That’s a great goal. I’m sure God will lead you on the right path to reach it.”

 _Oh_ , Toni thinks, _she’s one of_ those _people._

“Yeah. I’m positive that God doesn’t plan on leading me anywhere but the fiery pits of hell,” Toni can’t help but blurt out.

It’s a defense mechanism. She knows that. Yet, Toni doesn’t handle interactions with new people very well. She certainly doesn’t make great first impressions, aside from Martha of course. This is why it’s not a shock to her that she’s lashing out at a girl she doesn’t even know, and sure she feels bad, but the mention of God mixed with her rising rage just brings the words out of her.

Surprisingly, Shelby doesn’t fire back at her with some equally rude retort or try and defend God or something to Toni.

One side of her mouth lifts the slightest bit, and she says, “I guess we’ll see about that won’t we?” And Toni’s so caught off guard by the answer that she nearly chokes on her own saliva but has just enough control to swallow it back.

Before she can even think of a response, Shelby takes a sparkly blue pen out of her bag and pulls off the cap. Without any warning, she reaches out and takes a hold of Toni’s arm, and scribbles down a couple of numbers. Toni’s still trying to come up with a response, otherwise, she’d be ripping her arm out of the other girl’s grasp.

“Here’s my number.” The blonde caps the pen and puts it back. Delicately, she pulls her bag up onto her shoulder and rises from her seat. “Text me and we can meet up some time outside of class to talk about our project since we didn’t exactly do that today.” Shelby giggles before literally waltzing away. “Bye, Toni.”

Toni watches her leave and realizes that she’s the only one left in the room besides Professor Klein, who’s also packing up her stuff. Sometime in the middle of their conversation, Toni had completely tuned out the outside world and she doesn’t like that Shelby was the one that distracted her.

She can’t get distracted for a number of reasons. First of all, she needs her focus to be on basketball if she doesn’t want to end up homeless and a loser. And secondly, if anything _is_ going to distract her, it’s definitely not going to be some Jesus-loving girl who’s probably living off her daddy’s money.

Still, Toni can’t help but think five words as the classroom door shuts behind Shelby.

_What the fuck just happened?_


End file.
